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Characterization of Limonoids in Citrus Essential Oils by Means of Supercritical Fluid Chromatography Tandem Mass Spectrometry

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Abstract

The dual purpose of this research was to investigate the presence of limonoid aglycones in Citrus essential oils and to develop a rapid and reliable SFC-APCI-QqQ MS method for their characterization. In this study, 12 limonoid aglycones were tentatively identified in 11 different citrus essential oils. The developed method allowed a very fast separation in less then 7 min with a very low amount of organic solvent. Calibration curve of limonin was constructed by using a triple quad MS detector in order to quantify the limonin content in the analyzed samples. The content of limonin ranged from 0.5 (clementine essential oil) to 21.2 mg L−1 (bergamot essential oil) in the cold-pressed Citrus essential oils analyzed. Moreover, product ion scan (PIS) acquisition mode was also used for the structure elucidation of isobaric compounds. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first investigation on limonoid aglycones in Citrus essential oils.

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Acknowledgments

We gratefully thank Shimadzu and Merck KGaA corporations for their continuous support. Adriana Arigò thanks the “Prof. Antonio Imbesi Foundation” of the University of Messina for the financial support. Fabio Salafia tanks the “Programma Operativo Fondo Sociale Europeo (FSE) Regione Sicilia 2014-2020-Asse 3 Ob. 10.5” for thefinancial support.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Dipartimento di “Scienze Chimiche, Biologiche, Farmaceutiche ed Ambientali”, University of Messina, Polo Annunziata, viale Annunziata, 98168, Messina, Italy

    Mariosimone Zoccali, Adriana Arigò, Fabio Salafia, Paola Dugo & Luigi Mondello

  2. Department of Medicine, University Campus Bio-Medico of Rome, via Alvaro del Portillo 21, 00128, Rome, Italy

    Marina Russo, Paola Dugo & Luigi Mondello

  3. Chromaleont s.r.l., c/o Dipartimento di Scienze Chimiche, Biologiche, Farmaceutiche ed Ambientali, University of Messina, Polo Annunziata, viale Annunziata, 98168, Messina, Italy

    Paola Dugo & Luigi Mondello

Authors
  1. Mariosimone Zoccali
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  2. Adriana Arigò
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  3. Marina Russo
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  4. Fabio Salafia
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  5. Paola Dugo
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  6. Luigi Mondello
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Correspondence to Luigi Mondello.

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Conflict of Interest

Mariosimone Zoccali declares that he has no conflict of interest. Adriana Arigò declares that she has no conflict of interest. Marina Russo declares that she has no conflict of interest. Fabio Salafia declares that he has no conflict of interest. Paola Dugo declares that she has no conflict of interest. Luigi Mondello declares that he has no conflict of interest.

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Zoccali, M., Arigò, A., Russo, M. et al. Characterization of Limonoids in Citrus Essential Oils by Means of Supercritical Fluid Chromatography Tandem Mass Spectrometry. Food Anal. Methods 11, 3257–3266 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12161-018-1303-1

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12161-018-1303-1

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